Tiziano Vecellio (1576), - Angelo con tamburello

Oil on copper plate – A tribute to Titian Vecellio’s “Angel with the Tambourine” (ca. 1508)

Delicate and of great charm, this oil painting on copper plate, achievable in the mid-nineteenth century, constitutes a faithful and sensitive homage to one of Titian Vecellio’s most evocative early works: the Angel with the Tambourine (oil on panel, ca. 1508), today housed in the Doria Pamphilj Gallery in Rome and recently reassessed by critics as a fragment of an altarpiece executed for the church of Santa Maria dei Servi in Ferrara.
The subject depicts a full-length putto, seated on a projecting architectural element or a stone base, with blue and white wings, curly red-blonde hair, head turned upward in an expression of ecstasy and sweetness.
It wears a yellow-gold tunic with soft, luminous folds, belted at the waist, and supports with both hands a tambourine with a red frame. The dark, sober background highlights the figure, while the brick floor and architectural details confer depth and compositional solidity.

The nineteenth-century artist, trained and still rooted in the academic tradition and in the revival of the great sixteenth-century masters, carefully revived the dynamic pose, the fluid drapery, and the chromatic vitality of the Tiziano-inspired model, translating them into the oil on copper technique, supports highly valued in the nineteenth century for their smooth surface and their ability to enhance bright colors and minute details.

Elegant wooden frame carved and gilded with gold leaf, in a Neoclassical-Baroque taste with volutes and acanthus leaves at the corners, in good condition and fully coherent with the painting’s period.
Conservation status: Overall good. The painted surface shows light craquelure and some signs of time, typical of the age, without evident invasive interventions. The copper plate remains stable; the frame shows minor wear and losses of gilding, coherent

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